Beat the ‘Blue Monday’ spending blues with CAP

It was due to be the day that Christmas-period spending hits home along with the realisation that the New Year doesn’t automatically make problems of the previous year disappear.

So as the Christmas glow fades, New Year’s resolutions are broken, cold Winter weather has set in and credit card bills are piling up, one week ahead of payday, to coincide with “Blue Monday” a free CAP Money Course will be held in the Seventh Day Adventist Church Hall on 29 January and 5 February from 7-9pm.

There will also be a CAP Student Course on Wednesday, February 27, from 11am-2pm (lunch and refreshments provided).

Matt Barlow, CAP UK chief executive, said: “We began this course because we saw how financial crisis messed up relationships and caused havoc with health and well-being.

“The CAP Money Course is there to debt-proof families against this kind of stress and with something like a third of us relying on credit to get us through Christmas it might be the best resolution you can make going into 2013.”

During these sessions, they will be helped to create a household budget, prioritise their spending, begin building up their savings, and re-organise their banking products.

Mr Barlow said that some 20,000 people have made use of the debt prevention sessions in recent years. It has also been reported that twice as many families in Northern Ireland experience poverty as elsewhere in the UK, and according to CAP, 40% of the people they have helped had considered or even attempted suicide before coming to them for help.

New research released suggests that up to 30 lives in Northern Ireland are being saved from suicide every month thanks to the debt counselling charity.

Jayne McConaghie, Senior Health Promotion Officer for Mental Health at the Northern Trust, says that being in debt can contribute to mental health problems or indeed make them worse.

She said, “Debt is not just a financial problem but can have a serious impact on a person’s mental health in terms of anxiety and stress, depression, self harm and suicidal thoughts. It can cause people to become excluded, in turn making mental health problems worse.

“Fortunately there is help available for anyone in this situation. No debt problems are unsolvable and the earlier they are dealt with the better. Tackling debt as soon as it starts to mount up can help prevent mental health problems associated with debt.”

Whether you would like to be debt free or debt proof or want to help someone else then this course is for you.

To find out more or to book your free course e-mail [email protected] or phone Simone 07785 255 878.